Thursday, 8 December 2011

(Agg)Romania(Santos.com)

Just so you know, the above title is an altered lyric from the concurrently ridiculous and amazing 'Candy' by Aggro Santos. If you want to catch Aggro live then you soon can, at Chichester Crown Court on January the 5th, supported by... Well, his lawyers, presumably. Anyway, Romanian chart et cetera et cetera.

Tinie Tempah is at Number 87 with 'Written In The Stars'. A bit of a tune, but not his finest. No, that would be 'Pass Out', which he performed on US X Factor last week, keeping in the 'Scunthorpe' line. That, ladies and gentlemen, is why Tinie Tempah is one hundred percent a Good Thing. Oh and in case you were wondering, Scunthorpe is rubbish, even by dilapidated northern UK town standards.

There's a new entry at Number 79 for DJ Sava and Andreea D and it is called 'Free'. "Free like the morning sun," is Andreea, "and I'm going, free at last" and you get the idea. Anyway, despite the fact that the morning sun isn't really free - it just goes up from the east down to the west, every single day, without fail - it's quite good. It's got brass in it and apparently Sava has something to do with Raluka of 'Out Of Your Business' brilliance and if that isn't a a mark of a class product then Lord knows what is.

Like dreadful Italian style rock? Well you're wrong to do so, but there was some at Number 55, although you'll have to find out what it was called for yourself because the woman on the radio didn't say what it was. Mohombi's 'Bumpy Ride' was just ahead of it at Number 54 though, so that somewhat balanced things out. And then thatBruno Marssong about rain came on (for it is at Number 50). "I'll never be your mother's favourite" is genuinely one of the lyrics in that. Better get yourself back to the shop quick to replace his album for the Bublé one then, because otherwise yours will be distinctly underwhelmed by her Christmas present. "That Bruno Mars," she'll sigh, barely masking her utter disdain for you and the lack of thought you have given to the purchasing of her gift, "he'll never be my favourite". Perhaps if he started making stereotypical 'housewife-friendly' pop then he might sell more copies. Until then, he'll have to remain something of a niche proposition.

When you are recording a song and you have Arash what do you do? What you do, it would seem, is make 'Broken Angel', a very nice sort of OneRepublic-ish midtempo ballad with added European influences. This is, of course, providing that you are a female vocalist called Helena and that when you're talking about Arash you mean you're with the balding Swedish-Iranian popstar who took Azerbaijan to a third place finish at Eurovision in 2009. If not then you probably want to get that checked out. Apparently 'Broken Angel' came out over a year ago so God knows why it's still in the Romanian Top 50 (at 46, to be precise) but as the old saying goes, "when God gives you lemonade, you drink the lemonade".

MILLI-MILLION, MILLI-MILLION, MILLI-MILLI-MILLI-MILLI-MILLI-MILLION, Alexandra Stan is one place ahead of that at Number 45 (the song is called 'One Million').

No sign of LadBanter yet, but their single isn't out until January so give them time.

One 'curiosity' of the Romanian charts is that at the moment at least they seem to contain about 5 songs that are based on 'Yé ké yé ké'. How this has come to be is unclear. The Romanians clearly love Latin influences in their pop music, though seemingly not so much African ones. So what is it that's so attractive about this one Guinean song from almost 25 years ago? It was popular across Europe then too, so it's not exactly a new thing, but it's nonetheless odd. On second thoughts they do also love wordless and nonsensical hooks - viz 'One Million' and the rather splendid 'Lala Song' by Grasu XXL and Guess Who, at Number 19 this week. Perhaps it could be something to do with that. Perhaps it could, and should, remain a mystery. PERHAPS.

And there we have it. Below you will find this week's Top 10. You may notice that many of the songs in it appear to have been there since the dawn of time. Then again you're not the one who's been compiling this bloody thing so you probably won't. Anyway:

And that is Lykke Li's fourth week at the top. Lykke: even though you may eventually be deposed, never forget that, as the late, great Whitney Houston once said, "you're a winner for a lifetime". Never forget that. And here's the bit that goes... Except...